Hopulist Issue2

A number of craft breweries have
asked that their beer be removed
from RateBeer after news broke
that Anheuser-Busch-InBev (a
multinational brewing company
best known for it’s production
of Budweiser) had purchased a
minority stake in the beer-rating
website. Although news of the
acquisition only broke in July the
deal had actually taken place in
October of 2016.
In a statement on the Dogfish
Head Brewery website it’s founder
and president, Sam Calagione
wrote: “It is our strong opinion that
AB-InBev’s ownership of RateBeer,
and other properties positioned to
cover the craft brewing community
like October and thebeernecessities.
com is in direct conflict with
multiple guidelines listed (in the
Society of Professional Journalists
(SPJ) Code of Ethics).
“To that end, we have respectfully
asked AB-InBev and RateBeer
to remove all Dogfish Head beer
reviews and mentions on the
RateBeer website immediately. It
just doesn’t seem right for a brewer
of any kind to be in a position
to potentially manipulate what
consumers are hearing and saying
about beers, how they are rated
and which ones are receiving extra
publicity on what might appear to
be a legitimate, 100 percent usergenerated
platform. It is our opinion
that this initiative and others are
ethically dubious and that the lack
of transparency is troubling.”
RateBeer has since refused any
request to remove brewery’s scores
from its website.
WE SAY...
In issue one
of Hopulist,
before this news
broke into the
mainstream media,
we used RateBeer
as a source for
their online ratings.
We believe that
rating websites play
a critical role in the
decision making
of the consumer
and having that
potentially
compromised isn’t
something that we
feel comfortable
with. There is
clearly a potential
conflict of interest
in the site being
part-owned by
the world’s largest
beer company and
as such we have
taken the decision
to change our
ratings to another
resource.